


dear b

by hollowbirds (torturousthings)



Series: Prompts [7]
Category: Panic! at the Disco
Genre: M/M, Ryden, Rydon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-03
Updated: 2018-08-03
Packaged: 2019-06-21 10:23:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15555651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/torturousthings/pseuds/hollowbirds
Summary: Ryan writes Brendon a letter.fromthis prompt meme5. things you didn't say at all.





	dear b

_dear b,_

_god, b. what a stupid thing to call someone. a ridiculous diminutive, but i can’t bring myself to write the whole thing, not just yet. spell it out, string the seven letters together. child’s play. we’ve reached a new level of pathetic that i can’t even begin to fathom._

_i’ve been thinking so much lately that it’s been hard not to find myself back in that studio space, or in that cabin, or on stage by your side. you know, the hundreds of shows and hours we spent together, talking, laughing, sometimes screaming. never crying. i’m not sure why; surely some moments were worth a tear or two. maybe i just can’t remember. i think we’re programmed to forget some shitty parts, or our lives wouldn’t seem worth living at all._

_and i’ve also been thinking about the things i kept quiet. often for various reasons, that i have time to list right now, so here we are. i hope you’re sitting down, your legs might get sore. if your head does instead, the best thing to do is just stop reading. take some aspirin, tylenol. whatever mind-numbing agent you have at hand. in advance, i’m sorry._

  * _first, how far you’ve come; that topic i’ve stayed silent on because i don’t know how to put this without my heart growing full, and a text will never be able to cut it. i doubt a letter will, but i’ll try my best. i’m so proud of you. for everything you’ve done, for overcoming your fears and growing, growing so much that sometimes i need to look away from a headline on my screen to remember the person i used to know. i can see us, still, barely twenty-one, trying to get into that speakeasy on fifth street. you haven’t forgotten, i know. i’d be lying if i said i don’t mindlessly pick up words in the things you write, storing them in the back of my mind for later dissection. i never write back, and maybe it’s the fear of misappropriation. of finding something that’s not there, that’s never been there. maybe you never write to me at all. maybe it’s all hallucinations and fever dreams. so many maybes._


  * _breaking apart; that was inevitable. i want you to know that. deep down, i hope i still know you, bren. i know you must’ve tortured yourself and it pains me just to think about it. and perhaps i deserve that pain. you’ll think i’m a snob because of this, but i just remembered this old chinese poem i read somewhere. it reads, people have sorrows, joys, partings and reunions, just like the moon darkens, brightens, waxes and wanes; it has been this way since ancient times._



_i’m pretty sure ancient chinese men have some kind of unquestionable wisdom, and that these few years have just been a waning moon. just like the tide, brendon. we’re just like the tide._

_this next one’s gonna be tough._

  * _i’m sorry; how do you apologise to someone for breaking their heart? you don’t. or you wait ten years to do it, in a letter. like a coward. i’m sorry for all the storming away, the sullen silences, the shouting. breaking your guitar. your heart. hopefully nothing else. i thought we could be beautiful, b, i really did. there was so many things we could’ve been. it was all circumstances. the odds were too concentrated on the band not to be against us, and that’s okay. i made my peace with that long ago, back in that cabin that drove us all a little insane._


  * _long-due congratulations; i hope you and sarah are as happy as you deserve to be. i’m sorry i wasn’t there for the day you said your vows. seeing the beautiful invitation in my mail felt too much like blasphemy for me to come taint that day. i’m sorry, but i don’t regret staying away. it was a day to look forward to the future, not for reminiscing._



_and, lastly, a confession, not just a hushed thought. something that i’ve gotten so used to tucking away in the deepest folds of my brain that it’s a second nature now, something you’d hate me for if i told you, and i’m telling you, because it’s almost as though i’d rather you hate me than you feel nothing at all. yeah, i’m that desperate to let you know. if things had been different, bren, if we hadn’t had all those people to disappoint and reputations to destroy, i might’ve told you sooner. maybe when you kissed me in spencer’s basement, or maybe on one of those never-ending nights where i’d stay up to talk to you._

_and, by this point, you already know what it is i want to say, so i won’t. i’ll keep it filed under_ things i didn’t say _, stored away, only this time with no regret. there is no use in dwelling on the could’ve beens, and this is the last time i’ll let it come to my mind again._

_thank you, brendon. thank you for everything you’ve brought into my life, whether you know it or not. thank you for changing it. for changing everything. i owe you forever._

**Author's Note:**

> i hope you know ryan never did end up sending this letter, either tossing it into the fire or leaving it on his desk to be drowned in other papers, until one day he digs it up and breaks his own heart all over again.


End file.
